The dreaded day that any family traveling with small children can understand. The furthest the girls have flown have been 3.5 hour flights up until now.
Let me begin by saying all 3 girls were INCREDIBLE TRAVELERS! Our first leg of the trip was a 2 hour flight to SLC, with a brief layover just long enough to stretch our legs, grab lunch, use the restrooms & burn a little energy running around. The 2nd leg of the travel day was SLC to Maui, 5 hrs 55min. Going into this last and final leg of the trip… I would be lying if I said I felt confident in how the girls would behave.
From MSP —> SLC, Lenny napped the entire flight, she woke up while we were landing. She was snoozing before we even left the gate. Perfect start to the trip, we were all so impressed! Ro & Fin kept busy snacking, watching shows & playing games. 2 hour flights, easy peasy, as long as the sassy 2 year old sleeps! haha.
SLC—> OGG (Maui), think of your daily life with 3 children over a span of 6 hours. What does it look like? How many activities? How many tantrums? How many bursts of energy? How many times are you saying ”no”, ”stop fighting”, “why the attitude”…the list goes on! 6 hours in my everyday life looks very busy, so imagine how I feel bottling up 6 hours with the girls stuck in a seat on a plane! I was nervous.
6 hour flight and I am happy to report, no meltdowns, no tantrums, no fighting, not even a “are we there yet“. Games were played. 3 full movies were watched. Ro ended up falling asleep with 2 hours left in the flight. Lenny sat so good in her car seat, watching movies with no sound because she wouldn’t keep headphones on. With 3 hours left in the flight she finally stopped fighting her heavy eyes & fell asleep. She woke up with 30 min left & we were beginning our descent. I’m not sure how we all survived, I’m not sure how I got so lucky with this travel day, but I’m so thankful!
We landed in Maui earlier than expected, bonus! I have been perspiring for this trip for months. Covid restrictions, Covid requirements to even travel here, how to bypass mandated quarantine…all the things! How to make the airport checkpoints for our Covid QR code go as well as I could. All the stress & sleepless nights leading up to this trip. Only to find that we could get pre-cleared at SLC gate, they were good with QR code & didn’t need all the paper printouts that every blog I had read leading up to this trip said were required! Upon Hawaii arrival, I had pictured going through a “customs” line… which if you have gone through customs internationally you know, it can go fast or it can be a headache! With 3 small children and 11 hours of travel day the last thing I needed was a hassle or complications with the clearing process!
I’m happy to report we had ZERO issues at the Maui (OGG) airport, hooray!! We had wristbands on from being pre-cleared in SLC, which probably made this whole process so fast & convenient, which I am forever thankful for! We didn’t lose any luggage! Josh’s golf clubs weren’t damaged in transit, thank the good lord!
We got a rental car through a local car rental company, in my research I found it was affordable, great reviews, and it was supporting a local Maui business! It was also the convenience factor for me, they delivered car right to the public parking, just outside of the baggage claim doors! Throughout our travels I have learned rather quickly, avoid shuttles! 3 kids, 3 adults, 6 suitcases, a jogger stroller, a car seat on wheels...all the things to load, unload and do it all over again…it’s a hassle! Is the vehicle the nicest and newest, no! But will it drive us all around the island, yes!! I didn’t need to spend $2,000 on a car rental through a big rental company, when I could cut the rental over 50% & could support a Maui small business! The reviews when I booked our reservation stated, awesome customer service, not the newest, but affordable & you don’t look as “touristy”… that review hit a home run! We are on an island, I want to be a part of the islanders! We unfortunately can’t fit in a mustang or jeep to see the island with our crew so a minivan is our go to!
Thanks for hanging out with me today & this lengthy post that I didn’t intend to be this long!
That’s all for now!
XO - KK
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